Five Ways to Say “Thank You”

It’s time to return to my favorite topic:  Saying thank you.  Sometimes, when I know I need to write a thank you note, I swear I hear my mom - God rest her soul - yelling at me from the kitchen, “Have you written Aunt Peggy a thank you note for the calendar yet?”  As a kid, I hated sitting down at the table, looking at a piece of blank stationary, and thinking about what I would say.  But you know what?  As soon as I actually started the writing process, it wasn’t so bad – it conjured up good memories and a thankful spirit within me (believe me, I never revealed this to my mother).
    
So, without sounding like my mom in the least, “Have you written your thank you notes yet?”  If not, here are some additional ways to say “thank you” to your congregation:

1.    Pick up the phone.  Surprise someone with a random call to say, “Thank you.”  If no one is home, leave a message on the answering machine.  What a lovely thing to hear when you get in from shopping or from a hard day at work.

2.    Host a barbeque.  Invite folks over for no other reason than to offer gratitude for the gifts they offer to the church.

3.    Say it in worship.  Thank your congregation for the many ways they are generous.  If people believe they are generous, they often will act generous.  (See more about this in my post “Acknowledging Generosity”)

4.    Have a “thank you” Sunday.  On a random Sunday, have balloons up with the words “thank you” written on them.  Feature people who have given service to the church and to the community.

5.    Write notes.  OK, this isn’t new.  But, it is easy – really – and so important to do.  After I suggested writing cards to your congregation for Valentine’s Day, I received a wonderful email from Rev. Kathy Raines of Caldwell (Idaho) United Methodist Church who took me up on my idea. She observed, “I didn’t anticipate that I would become more thankful for my congregation, as I wrote the notes and thought of other sentiments to write in the cards.”  

Thankfulness begets thankfulness.  So, thanks Mom for hounding me to do the right thing.  Now…get going and say “thank you”!

One more thing:  Our thoughts have been with Moore, Oklahoma in the last few days.  Remind your congregation that UMCOR (United Methodist Committee on Relief) is a great place to make a contribution to help with rebuilding. And, it’s easy to do on line. I should know – I just made my donation.
 

Cesie Delve Scheuermann is a consultant in stewardship, development, and grant writing.   Over the past decade, while working as a volunteer and part-time consultant, she helped raise nearly $2 million dollars for numerous non-profit organizations.  She served as the Oregon-Idaho Annual Conference Lay Leader from 2008-2012.  Her position with the Conference is funded through a generous grant from the Collins Foundation.  You can reach her at inspiringgenerosity@gmail.com.

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Is Your Church Contagious?

My friend Mark is really smart.  So when he handed me the book Contagious: Why Things Catch On by Jonah Berger, I knew it was a must read.  I took the opportunity to bring it along on a recent coast-to-coast flight.  After warming up my intellect with People magazine (hey, don’t judge), I came away from reading Contagious inspired. Churches who are committed to spreading the Good News ought to read it as well. 

Berger outlines six principles (STEPPS) that make things contagious (adapted here for us churchy types): 

1.     Social Currency:  How do you look to others when you talk about your church or missions you sponsor?  Because they like who you are and what they see, will others be inspired to be in partnership with you?  Is your congregation involved in activities that make you passionate?

2.     Triggers:  How do we remind people to talk about our church or externally-focused projects?  If someone in your town sees a backpack – will they think of your church’s backpack program?  If someone hears the words “stamp out hunger,” does your church come to mind?

3.     Emotion:  How can the church craft messages and ideas that make people feel something?  Is your church known as “God’s frozen chosen?”  To be clear, that would be the opposite of “emotion.”  Help your congregation experience something that gets their heart pumping, makes them smile, or even shed a tear – as Berger says “when we care, we share.”

4.     Public:  Can people outside the church see when you are engaging in desired behavior?  In God talk:  Don’t hide your lamp under a bushel.

5.     Practical Value:  What useful significance to every day life does your church offer to your congregation and community?  Many people in our communities would be inspired to attend classes being offered by our congregations (think Financial Peace University and parenting programs) – if only they knew about them.

6.     Stories:  Any regular reader of this blog already knows the importance of telling your story.  As Berger says, “We need to do more than just tell a great story…We need to make our message so integral to the narrative that people can’t tell the story without it.”  What story is associated with your congregation?

But don’t let this very abbreviated list be the end.  Contagious is chock full of great examples of how every day people made their ideas and products catch on.  Each congregation has something that should make them “contagious.”  What are you waiting for?  Spread God’s love.

Cesie Delve Scheuermann is a consultant in stewardship, development, and grant writing.   Over the past decade, while working as a volunteer and part-time consultant, she helped raise nearly $2 million dollars for numerous non-profit organizations.  She served as the Oregon-Idaho Annual Conference Lay Leader from 2008-2012.  Her position with the Conference is funded through a generous grant from the Collins Foundation.  You can reach her at inspiringgenerosity@gmail.com.

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Five Ways to Make Your Church’s Message “Pop”

This week, the United Methodist General Board of Global Ministries unveiled a new infographic on Advance special gifts. You may have already seen it since it quickly made the rounds on Facebook and found its way into many email boxes.  This may be the most successful marketing piece that GBGM has put out.  Why is it so effective?

•    You get the picture, literally, where your money is going.       

•    Something that is hard to understand suddenly is clear.  The dreaded and often unfairly maligned apportionments fund The Advance’s overhead - thus allowing 100% of donations to go specific projects.  That’s good use of money.

•    There is momentum for the future.  My denomination has a goal of eradicating malaria in the next few years.  Now that’s inspiring.

•    It’s invitational.  “Let’s get moving!” is not the battle cry of a stodgy old denomination.  United Methodists’ are doing something…and we are joyfully invited to participate.

•    It is teeming with gratitude.  From the final “thank you” to the listing of projects you and I have helped fund over the years, this moves us to want be a part of the Advance movement.

Decide how you can use the success of the GBGM infographic and make it work for your church. Don’t be intimidated by the professionals.  Someone in your congregation can take pictures and maybe someone else can combine them with words of gratitude, a call to action, and evidence that what you are doing in the world is making a difference.  You can make an equally inspiring flier.  Don’t overthink it – just do it.  

 

Cesie Delve Scheuermann is a consultant in stewardship, development, and grant writing.   Over the past decade, while working as a volunteer and part-time consultant, she helped raise nearly $2 million dollars for numerous non-profit organizations.  She served as the Oregon-Idaho Annual Conference Lay Leader from 2008-2012.  Her position with the Conference is funded through a generous grant from the Collins Foundation.  You can reach her at inspiringgenerosity@gmail.com.

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Giving Out of Obligation

I was back in school last week.  Well, sort of.  I spent four days in Seattle steeped in “Creating Congregational Cultures of Generosity” sponsored by the Pacific Northwest Annual Conference and the Northwest UM Foundation.  We were very fortunate to have with us and learn from Dr. Bill Enright, Director of the Lake Institute on Faith & Giving, part of the Indiana University School of Philanthropy.  What a great experience!

I am still on information overload (thankfully, no papers to write or tests to take!) but there was one set of statistics I keep reflecting on:

In one study, 89% of Presbyterians (or mainliners) said they gave to their congregation “Out of responsibility or obligation as a member of this church” compared to 6% of Presbyterians who said they gave “Because everything I have is God’s.”

Wow.  There’s a spiritual disconnect going on.

You may legitimately ask, what’s the problem with people giving out of obligation if the bills are getting paid?  If that is your understanding of the spiritual life and if your church doors are still open, albeit barely, then I guess it’s working for you.  

However, if our call as Christ followers is to live a life centered on Jesus, then our giving needs to be out of gratitude and devotion to the One to whom all things belong.  John Wesley so eloquently stated: “Not, how much of my money will I give to God, but how much of God’s money will I keep for myself.”  Even better is 2 Corinthians 9:7 “Each of you must give as you have made up your mind, not reluctantly or under compulsion [or obligation?], for God loves a cheerful giver.”  

How can you move people from “obligation-centered” to “spiritually-centered” giving?

•    Preach more about what Jesus said regarding money and possessions
•    Provide concrete examples of people who inspire you to live generously
•    Encourage your congregation to read the Bible on a daily basis so that they can see for themselves what the Good Book says about generosity
•    Make giving a joyous and celebratory experience

What a great day it will be when the next survey comes out and the statistics are reversed:  6% give out of obligation to the church and 89% give because “everything I have is a gift from God.”  That will be a "hallelujah" moment, indeed.
 

Cesie Delve Scheuermann is a consultant in stewardship, development, and grant writing.   Over the past decade, while working as a volunteer and part-time consultant, she helped raise nearly $2 million dollars for numerous non-profit organizations.  She served as the Oregon-Idaho Annual Conference Lay Leader from 2008-2012.  Her position with the Conference is funded through a generous grant from the Collins Foundation.  You can reach her at inspiringgenerosity@gmail.com.

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“The Church is Only Interested in Money”


Author and avid Facebooker Diana Butler Bass recently posted this on her wall: 

“On today's flight, I was sitting next to a 30-something fellow, married w/little kids. A former Catholic, he now goes to a small Protestant church with his family. Despite that, he is not satisfied. Told me that most churches are 1) overly interested in money; 2) too programmatic; 3) inauthentic; and 4) preach too much about politics instead of serving the poor…”

Each one of these points deserves its own discussion, but the one that (of course) piqued my interest was his #1 pet peeve: “churches are overly interested in money.”  At workshops I ask, “What do you fear most about the topic of stewardship?”  Time and time again I hear that 30-something’s refrain, “people will think we talk too much about money.”

What does this mean?  As our dear brother Rev. Bill Mullette-Bauer says, “Jesus talked a lot about money.”  When someone says the church talks too much about money, I mind moves immediately to the annoying and slick TV evangelist (you know the one I’m talking about) who constantly asks for cash to keep the show on the air.

Perhaps Diana’s seatmate had a similar experience – the pitch was the same but in a different context.  I am guessing that this fellow was attending a church that was dying and the preacher was begging for funds to “keep the lights on.”  No one, and I mean no one, wants to give to a sinking ship.  It’s distressing for people in the pews to keep hearing “how money is tight” or “apportionments must be paid.”  All that might be true, but if that’s the sole message about money, no wonder people view it negatively.

Because we are faithful followers (or are at least striving to be) of Jesus, and because Jesus talked about money and possessions nearly as much as he talked about love, it is our responsibility to challenge people in the pew with the reality of the Gospel.  Some potential questions might be: As Christians, how should we look at money?  What does Jesus say about possessions and what’s the implication for first-world believers?  Besides talking theologically about money, also and always tell people how their hard-earned dollars are changing lives – inside and outside the church.  That’s a far different message than pleading with people to fund a budget.

Some day, I pray we will get past the fear that someone will reject us because “we are overly interested in money,” especially if we are talking about money because we are preaching Jesus.


Follow-up:  In January I posted I Do Exist!  Getting the Thank you Letter Right where I kvetched about not receiving a thank you letter for a special memorial gift I sent.  I am happy to report that last week, four months after I sent the letter, I received a very sweet, hand written thank you letter.  This goes to show you that it’s never too late to say “thank you.”  People remember and they notice.
 

 Change and Online Giving

I am not a big fan of change.  I hate it when my favorite TV show is cancelled (please ABC, don’t cancel “Nashville”!).  Sometimes sticking with what I know is a good thing because it makes me feel secure (Bruce Springsteen will never retire, right?), but more often, it keeps me stuck and missing out on something much better than I ever thought possible.

So, let me reiterate, change is hard.  According to a new study by the Lake Institute on Faith and Giving and reported on in the Chronicle of Philanthropy, “Eighty-eight percent of churches with congregation members who were 35 or younger increased donations in 2011, while only 60 percent of those with members who were mostly 55 or older did so.  One reason for the increases, especially among young people, is that two-thirds of the congregations say they offer online-giving options” (emphasis added).

“Online-giving” gives people the option, through their home computer, to tithe via credit card, PayPal, or automatic bank deductions.  Not offering online giving means:

•    You are not reaching out to those who are “younger” in your congregation (35 or under)
•    You are stuck in one “acceptable” mode of giving (passing the plate)
•    You appear to “outsiders” that you are unwilling to change to meet the needs of a younger generation (so why come to your church in the first place?)

Clearly, this does not necessarily indicate that if you offer online giving younger people will flock to your church.  But it will signal to them that you know that this is how they (as well as many old-fogies) like to give on a regular basis.  And, surprise, they may even do so in a worshipful manner.  It is a legitimate way of giving.

If online giving is even remotely possible (i.e., you have a website), find someone in your congregation this week who will research the topic.  Set a deadline for when you will make a decision as to whether or not you will offer this as an option.  And, if you decide to take the plunge, do it. 

Online giving or change for change’s sake is not a magic solution to a church’s problems but it can signal a desire to do things differently and a willingness to reach out to all of God’s people…no matter their age.


Follow-up: 
In light of the tragedy at the Boston Marathon, here is a link to the article I wrote soon after the Newtown shootings:  “Generosity Even in the Face of Grief”

A couple of weeks ago I wrote a tribute to Gordon Cosby.  This past Sunday, there was a lovely piece about him on NPR.